Virtually everyone who uses a telephone is familiar with being put on hold when trying to reach a called party. Whether calling a restaurant, a mail-order business or the like, it is a common practice for the called party to place the calling party on “hold” when the called party is too busy to immediately answer the call. “Hold” is, in the telephone sense, a limbo-like state where the call from the calling party is suspended until the called party answers the call. Typically, after placing the calling party on-hold, the called party provides a sedate music selection or advertisement pitch for the calling party to listen to while the calling party waits for the called party to answer the line.
Unfortunately for the calling party, the only option after being placed on-hold is to wait until the called party answers (and, in the meantime, listen to whatever music or other information the called party provides) or to hang up the phone and try calling back later. Frequently, the calling party will become impatient, waiting for the called party to return to the telephone. The wait on hold usually seems much longer than it really is. In this manner, the calling party can get a sense that his time is being wasted: Additionally, the calling party can feel helpless, as the only options available to him are to wait or to hang up and try again later. In this sense, the wait on hold is not a very meaningful or valuable experience for the calling party.
It would be advantageous to both called parties that place calling parties on hold, as well as to the calling parties themselves, if systems and methods were provided whereby the calling party could have more control over the “on-hold” experience. Such systems and methods would be particularly advantageous if they occupied the calling party during the time he is on hold and, thereby, made the wait on hold seem valuable, or at least less wasteful. Consequently, there is a need for systems and methods that provide an “on-hold” calling party with selectable options that allow the calling party to control the on hold experience.